The Benefits of Outsourcing Social Media

1.pngSocial media isn’t just for teenagers! Whether you are a start-up company or an established brand, utilising a variety of channels to increase brand awareness and generate leads has many benefits. In fact, the possibilities are endless. Google aside, Facebook accounts for approx. 40% of website referral traffic.

Social media presents the opportunity to engage with your target audience, potential clients, easily become a thought leader in your sector and cross promote content. With 90% of businesses attributing increased brand exposure, and over half reporting improved sales just from social media, you should seriously consider optimising to reap the rewards.

Arguably, the most attractive aspect of social media is that it’s free! However, the consistency and regularity of posts is vital and an active social media presence is great for your business.

So, here’s why you should outsource your social media…

Messaging:

Although social media is a great tool for promotion, being perceived as too overtly salesy can do more damage than good. Therefore, it is imperative first and foremost to establish a genuine connection, listening and conversing with a human, empathic voice. Anyone can buy 1000 followers, but just as in real life, relationships aren’t built overnight and a loyal customer base evolves over time.

Quality, Consistency & increased ROI:

The best results are achieved by curating clever content which resonates with and benefits your target audience, in addition to joining in and responding to key trends and customer queries. A combination of commentary by a brand, mixed with agency input ensures the best of both worlds. An agency can organise and schedule PR and marketing activities to seamlessly align with social media efforts, generating an integrated campaign to achieve greater return on investment. Since content creation alone can take as much as 18.5% of the day, it’s worth outsourcing these activities, allowing more time to be spent on other areas of a business.

Paid Advertising:

Creating a social media account might appear to be free, but. in doing so the platform uses your profile and demographic information as currency. These social media platforms offer sophisticated segmentation tools enabling users to advertise, for a fee, to whoever fits the profile of their target customer. Additionally, the reporting features offer a wealth of metrics such as engagement, click-through rates etc. which provide valuable insight. Knowing how to set up advertising campaigns, how much to spend, which adverts work best and how to convert clicks into sales requires in-depth experience. When utilised correctly such strategies can be highly cost-effective in meeting sales and marketing strategies.

Efficiency:

It’s a fast-paced world, especially in social media, so it’s paramount to have a team who really know their stuff, from the latest Twitter updates to knowing which social media platform is right for your target audience. There’s no need to stress about self-teaching yourself the basics. Instead, leave it in the safe hands of an agency who can easily and effectiveness understand your goals, implement a blend of organic and scheduled tweets to grow your following, engage your audience and report back with key performance indicators.

So, what are you waiting for? Find out how you can benefit from outsourcing your social media right now.

Call us on 01483 537890 or, alternatively, email us hello@brookscomm.com and we can help you engage with your target audience successfully using Social Media.

Follow us @PRexpertsUK   Linkedin: brookscomm  Website: www.brookscomm.com

2017: PR Predictions

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Looking back, 2016 was a very eventful year for many different reasons. We witnessed PR moments from the likes of Jeremy Corbyn and Virgin Trains, Brangelina’s clever PR tactics, the exploding Samsung Galaxy saga, and of course, Brexit & Trump’s victory.

So, what will be in store for PR in 2017? Read on for our predictions…

1: Bloggers, vloggers & peer-to-peer reviews will become more influential

Forget multi-million-pound celebrity endorsements, consumers now favour and are more likely to be influenced by someone who is more relatable. Therefore, in 2017 there needs to be a focus on promoting reviews from bloggers, vloggers and your everyday consumer, as big ad campaigns and celebrity endorsements no longer resonate as much with consumers.

2: Tech PR growth will outstrip the rest of the industry

A report from last month’s PRCA PR & Comms Council meeting detailed a downturn in fees and activities in the corporate, financial, consumer and industrial PR sectors. But, that the healthcare and tech PR sectors are bucking this trend with some agencies reporting 30% growth in 2016 and forecasting up to 50% growth in 2017. This trend is evident by the record number of exhibitors and visitors to the CES show. In the healthcare sector, technological innovation is driving growth alongside US and UK Government initiatives to improve public sector cyber security.

3: PR professionals will need a broader range of skills

Good writing and communication skills are still fundamental attributes to anyone wishing to pursue a career in PR. However, the proliferation of social media demands that PR professionals need to adopt a range of content, publishing, design, and analytical skills and become familiar with a variety of digital tools. In addition, with clients expecting a more strategic service in 2017, it’s vital for PR professionals to have good business acumen.

4: PR will become more measurable & more integrated

The increasingly wide range of digital media platforms available to PR professionals will provide greater insight into the effectiveness of their activities. This is making PR just as measurable and accountable as sales and advertising activities.

By measuring each disciplines results, enlightened clients can see what works, what doesn’t and where a blend of integrated activities more often than not will lead to best results.

What do you think will be the trends to watch out for in 2017?

Social Media & Digital Marketing Glossary

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Clueless on SEO, unsure of whether you should #FF or scratching your head at the prospect of writing a meta description? Fear not, as we have compiled the ultimate jargon free Social Media and Digital Marketing glossary, ensuring you have a better understanding of these rather technical terms! With Social Media & Digital Marketing becoming more useful and influential, it’s worth keeping up-to-date on these concepts!

Breadcrumbs – A navigation trail for somebody who visits your website, giving direction of how to return to the homepage from any given page, e.g. Homepage>About Us>Careers.

Direct Message (DM’s) – A method of contacting privately other Twitter users, often only achieved if there’s a mutual follow, yet, depending on privacy settings this isn’t always the case.

Embedding – incorporating an external web link into your digital platform which displays content from a different location. i.e. a video from YouTube, slides from SlideShare video or photo which is hosted outside of your publishing platform.

Engagement rate –  a metric which shows the number of interactions with your digital content, i.e. visiting a webpage, clicking on a link, expanding a photo, likes, retweets, commenting: interacting in general. The higher the metric, the better the content!

Geotag – Twitter & Instagram allow people to ‘tag’ or pinpoint a location e.g. London, which involves the directional coordinates to be attached to content like a picture.

GIF – aka Graphics Interchange Format, a series of pictures or animation/clips from movies used to illustrate an emotion or even in response to a live event.

HTML – ‘Hypertext mark-up language’, programming language used to build and edit a website.

Impressions – the number of times content is viewed without it necessarily being searched or even clicked on.

Live streaming & live tweeting – delivering content over the internet in real-time, i.e. Periscope (Twitter) & Facebook Live. Tweeting, in real-time, live updates or events.

Meta description – description of your website or page which appears in the search results.

Ow.ly & bit.ly – tools that shorten the original URL of a webpage to considerably less characters. Highly beneficial to Twitter , where a maximum of 140 characters can be used in any post, which also includes analytics to determine click-through.

Promoted/sponsored content – content that is promoted and paid to appear by advertisers, in targeted publications or as the primary result from a search engine query. Often used to quickly raise the profile of a brand or product in association with a topic, keyword or service.

PPC – ‘Pay per click’, a fee is paid every time someone clicks on the advert.

Page rank – in a Google search ,it is where your page appears in relation to a relevant search query. Ranking is determined by Google’s algorithm which includes factors such as: relevance to search term, frequency of clicks, freshness of content, how long visitors spend on the page & HTML structure. Ideally, it’s best to ensure you appear on the first page of results, as 80% of searchers won’t click past the first page Page (reference?)

SEO – ‘Search engine optimisation’ is the practice of affecting the visibility of a website within search engines. Broadly speaking, methods to improve SEO can be categorised into two areas:

On-page SEO – Relevant, fresh, concise content which visitors spend time reading, and hopefully sharing, tells search engines that your page is valuable and your website is current. Seamlessly weaving keywords into well written content that loads quickly, is easy to navigate on any format, whether on a computer or mobile, helps with on-page SEO.

Search engines constantly crawl and index websites. Displaying quality content in a structured format that search engines recognise, improves ranking. So make sure page attributes such as meta descriptions, alt tags and sector titles are all present.

Off-page SEO – Simply put, this is the process of having links to your website from credible web sources. Search engines rank websites in terms of authority and relevance. This is where reviews, professional affiliations,  PR, social media and customer endorsement online can be used to help boost your ranking.  I.E. If you are a member of a trade organisation, have a link to and from their website.

Scheduling – using a social media platforms advanced functionality to schedule the publishing of content in advance, often used to target individuals in different time zones.

Trending topic – a list of the topics that are currently generating the most interest on social media. Clicking on the topic link reveals the most popular associated content.

We hope these explanations are helpful, if you are interested in other definitions do let us know!

At brookscomm we have over 20 years’ of PR expertise and a proven track record of success. We can aid you and your business, call us on 01483 537 890 or, alternatively, email us hello@brookscomm.com

Follow: Twitter@PRexpertsUK  Linkedin:brookscomm Website:www.brookscomm.com

Why networking still matters

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Humans are social animals and networking is a crucial part of life. From a young age, we learn to network effectively, enabling us to survive and thrive in the modern world. Just as in life, effective networking in business is vital to enhance reputation and expand connections.

According to Virgin.com, via hubspot, a staggering 95% of people view face to face meetings as essential to building successful business relationships.

For networking success 72% were significantly influenced by eye contact and a firm handshake.

High achieving modern professionals are expected to network on behalf of their businesses regularly. Whether it is a business briefing over breakfast, a party or general event, networking is crucial to promoting you and your business. In an ever changing, super busy workplace prioritising and juggling roles cleverly is vital. Which is why we have compiled these simple but effective networking tips, to get the most out of every single networking event.

Research

  • Prior to the event, do as much research as possible: find out who the attendees are, the host and, if there is an event hashtag, follow it!
  • Ensure your Linkedin is up to date & that your business cards are in check! No business cards? Fear not, the Linkedin mobile app will suffice and is just as effective, if not more so!
  • Prepare an elevator pitch about yourself and the company you work.
  • Be aware of current trends and topical issues that could be affecting a variety of businesses – it’s a great conversation starter!
  • Establish goals before you arrive. Do you want to learn from the industry, meet new people or collect 5 business cards?

Relax

  • Remember quality over quantity. Rather than just handing out as many business cards as possible, instead establish rapport and be sincere!
  • Relax, have fun and be yourself!
  • Focus on quality conversations and establishing worthwhile connections, without being overtly salesy!

Follow up

  • A day or so after the event, send a follow up email or contact them on LinkedIn reminding them who you are. Make sure you check in every so often to keep in touch! These connections can and often do lead to future opportunities.

These tips have worked well for us and we hope they will benefit you too! Happy networking!

At brookscomm we have over 20 years’ of PR expertise and a proven track record of success. We can aid you and your business, call us on 01483 537 890 or, alternatively, email us info@brookscomm.com

Follow: Twitter@PRexpertsUK  Linkedin:brookscomm Website:www.brookscomm.com

Diary of a PR newbie

Joe RamseyI’m currently studying for a career in Marketing and recently spent some time with the team at brookscomm team to learn about what goes on at a busy PR and Marketing agency. Here’s my account:

Wednesday 27/08/2016

On arrival at brookscomm I was greeted by the team, they instantly made me feel welcome and comfortable amongst them. I was firstly taken for an introduction chat where Mandy gave me an overview on PR and the objectives of the business. This was very helpful as it meant I was able to get some background on the company I was working for. After Mandy had finished, Jo then took over and spoke in more detail about how the office is run, she also informed me of the tasks I would be carrying out.

Digital marketing

Mike was next to approach me, he specialises in digital marketing which is one of my personal interests. He took me through various slideshows on personas and how PR is properly used for B2B. I found this very informative and beneficial. Mike is a very good communicator and is able to give you the relevant information whilst making you think and analyse for yourself.

The other member of the team is Ali who I worked with later in the day.

My first task was to do some research into blood doping for one of the clients, this was very difficult due to the variances in this subject however I was helped by Mike who was able to direct me correctly.

Team work

A team meeting was then called, the whole team gathered to discuss the position of their clients and their objectives for the coming days. I sat in on this session, it gave me an insight into how a PR businesses makes decisions and handles its clients. This meeting was positive throughout and each member of the team looked for my input which made me feel comfortable and able to contribute where appropriate.
After lunch I went back to work with Mike on the new website design. I analysed the website and then did similar for competitors, this exercise allowed brookscomm to get a new opinion on its website and what may be beneficial to change or maintain.

I concluded the day by working with Ali. She walked me though the process of getting a press release published, she also outlined the benefits of doing this for both the brand involved and brookscomm. She involved me in the process which was fantastic as I was able to see the theory behind it then get involved in the practical element of the press release, this gave me the tools to write my own press release.

Thursday 28/07/16

My day started by drafting a press release on one of Brookscomm’s clients. I did some research into the product, made some notes, and looked at similar products and their press releases. This research allowed me to have an in depth knowledge of the product and then write a press release. This took me the whole of the morning to complete. After lunch I sat down with Chaz Brooks who gave me feedback on my work, He was able to point out what was done well and how I would improve next time. This was helpful because I was able to see which aspects of my work needed altering.

Using Social Media

My next task was to compose some specific tweets about the business re-branding. Mandy sat down with me and communicated what she wanted to see being tweeted. This was a relatively simple task for me as I am a keen user of Twitter and other social media. The only thing I struggled with on this task is using appropriate language to reach my target audience.

Summary

Overall my experience with brookscomm was brilliant, they offer a highly professional working environment whilst making all the staff welcome and comfortable. brookscomm is an open forum for new and existing ideas to be considered and implemented. Everyone that works for brookscomm is clearly very well trained and believe in what they are working for, this means their personal and business goals complement each other and become easily reached through hard work. I am very thankful to be given the opportunity to work for brookscomm and its staff, I believe I have learnt skills and techniques that will benefit me immediately and later in life.

I’d like to thank Mandy, Chaz and all the staff for welcoming me into their work environment and sharing their knowledge with me.

Best wishes,

Joe Ramsey